Why Not Jusk Ask Us To Leave?

1. 58

   Williamjordanposted 13 years ago

   How all of sudden some of the best Hubs on my account are substandar I'll be the first to say I am not the best wirter but I have improved and I have a and average amount of follwer 471 and I have 56,000 pageviews and I have deleted about 13 hubs. I am not deleting anymore tell me to leave in I will. Just tell me wirter of my caliber are no longer wanted.

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      Cagsilposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      You, You, You
      
      It's not about you. It's about Hubpages as a business. Everyone is going through the same thing you are.
      
      No one is asking you, or even telling you to leave. They are in fact, telling you to be more careful and more productive with the things you do write.
      
      Things that are short are considered unacceptable.
      Things that are poor grammar are considered unacceptable.
      Things that are duplicate content, but already published, will be ripped down.
      
      The biggest problem is in training new moderators and overseeing their work. Yes, it is going to cause problems, but that is just part of the process. Accept it, make changes and move on.
      
      As for the other comments with regards to leaving up other people's work, that is just as bad if not worse, it is something HP is still working on. It happens.
      
      Just my thoughts on it.

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         BRIAN SLATERposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Not just your thoughts Cagsil, well said.

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   2. 71

      The Frog Princeposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      It seems that a bit of selectivity is being used in what is supposed to be an open forum.  I'll leave it at that.

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   3. 71

      AEvansposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Don't delete them just revise them all of us have had to fix hubs. Hang in there and weather the storm many if us are. If you have any questions about your hubs just e-mail the team@hubpages.com they will be assist you.

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2. 61

   BobbiRantposted 13 years ago

   Yes, I agree, stop picking on Some and yet the moderators leave other, worse ones, alone.  I couldn't agree more.

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   1. 87

      Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      If you're seeing worse ones, are you letting the HubPages team know about them?
      
      The HP moderators are human and they can't check every single Hub simultaneously - it takes time.  Plus there are new Hubs being posted every day. Naturally there will be some rubbish Hubs that aren't checked right away.
      
      Reading the comments, though, it does seem that moderators are aggravating Hubbers unnecessarily in the way they're handling this.
      
      If there is a human involved,who has to press a button to send an email saying "your Hub is substandard" - how hard would it be for them to add a few words to explain the specific  problem they've just identified?
      
      Seems to me the extra few seconds it would take, would be well spent - otherwise there's a risk of alienating good Hubbers for no good reason.

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3. 95

   wildernessposted 13 years ago

   There are many possible reasons for HP to unpublish a hub, and actual poor quality is only one.  While a hub may be poorly written, have poor english, spelling or grammar or be too short it is more likely to violate the HubPages TOS in some way.
   
   There have been several changes in the rules for writing hubs lately in an effort to counter the Panda change from google - you need to keep up with these rules and modify hubs that no longer comply.  For instance, pixelated photos are a no no - you have at least one hub with photos that are too large for the quality resolution of the photo itself.  While it may be an appropriate image for the hub, the photo is of such low quality that it looks bad and makes your hub look bad as well.  A TOS violation, but not a comment on the quality of your writing.
   
   These things are not aimed at your personally, but at making HubPages once more stand out in google's eyes and improve the site as a whole for everyone.

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4. 0

   Website Examinerposted 13 years ago

   Affordable proofreading services and quality reviews are available to Hubbers who want them. These programs were designed to help avoid problems, to optimize hubs and profile pages, and for the author to improve their skills. Several Hubbers are involved in providing this kind of assistance.

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   1. 58

      Williamjordanposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Website Exaniner you are a smart writer you probalby only write for profit SEO,and money is the name of the game.I'll call myself the lousy writer,who has considered hiring a writer or two;but only because I have six blogs about Issues that help every day people. But I would rather leave hub pages if I am hurting the community I just wish they had told ne 55,000 page views ago.

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         Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Williamjordan, I have not written a single article for profit or SEO.
         
         Your frustration is understandable, however you will recover from this setback.

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   2. 60

      Daffy Duckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      The problem isn't substandard hubs.  The problem is that very picky peole ar flagging and reviewing flagged hubs.  If the hubs have been ok for weeks, leave them alone.  Duplicated content is the only exception.  Other than that, Back Off!   

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         Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I don't flag hubs. I have never done Hub Hopping. I don't quite understand why you are quoting me here.

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         1. 60

            Daffy Duckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I'm not quoting you, I'm  saying there are other reasons besides what you've stated and what others believe.  Sorry about the confusion man.   

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               Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               No problem, you were replying to my post and I wondered why. Thanks for clarifying.

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      2. 82

         Mark Ewbieposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         So because some rubbish got on here a long time ago it should stay?  And we can all watch any chance of income go down the tubes?
         
         I'm happy for anything I write to be flagged, reviewed, etc. If it's not good enough - it shouldn't be on here.
         
         Doesn't matter who wrote it, how long it (or they) have been here.

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            SimeyCposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Well said! I have a ton of hubs and have had some flagged. I've deleted the substandard ones and corrected the TOS violators. I expect to get at least 10-20 more flagged hubs as the Hubpages team work through all hubs, so I'll continue to accept the flagging and react accordingly.
            
            If a hub is substandard or breaks the TOS rules then it has no business being published - even if it's written by the top writers, or the most lucrative writers!

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         2. 60

            Daffy Duckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I'm not saying rubbish should stay, I'm saying some people need to quit being so picky.  There are those that just can't be satisfied unless super strict guidelines are followed.  In other words--Extremely picky people need to shut up or leave.

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            1. 82

               Mark Ewbieposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               Well, that's one view. Not Google's view though.  A site that has been knocked down the rankings due to.. well form your own opinion obviously.
               
               Mine is that if you, or anyone put an article on here then you should consider what your own attitude would be if you came across it in a magazine or through a search.  Would you be pleased or just think "what a load of spammy crap?"
               
               However, that's just my view, and until traffic comes back - I'm sticking to it.
               
               On the plus side for those sneaking under the radar - I am sick of Hub hopping.  I just can't bear it - it rots my brain.

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                  Daffy Duckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  You know Mark, I absolutely agree with you.  People should consider what they write.  One problem is that rules and restrictions continue to change.  When that happens some hubs, that are perfectly fine, all of the sudden become less than ok under the new rules. 
                  
                  Why not just make the new rules and rule changes apply to hubs that are written after the changes take effect.  Just like laws of societies and rule changes in sports.
                  
                  Some hubs should obviously get taken down and do slip through the cracks, but it becomes a problem when good hubs are unpublished.
                  I'm not sure exactly what hubs are being questioned, but I do know this.
                  
                  Reasonable rules are necessary in anything.  There is a fine line between reasonable and oppression.  When people start to worry as much about the rules as they do about their activities then the joy is lost.  Unhappiness sets in, and soon people start to drift away from that particular activity.  As a famous line in Star Wars 4 goes:  "The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers".
                  
                  I just hope that any rejected hubs really should be rejected for good reasons instead of someone being super sensative.

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                  1. 82

                     Mark Ewbieposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                     Hi Daffy.  The reason why the rules have to apply backwards, and it is unfair on those people now caught out - is that Google is applying the rule to all content, old and new.  I don't believe HP would be doing this if everything was OK.  I don't know if what they are doing will work.
                     Since being here I have probably changed all my hubs on several occasions.  At first learning about Groups, and Links, and... RSS - and then cutting down adverts, news and... RSS.  It's a pain - but there is no choice. Not if we want Google Love and traffic.

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                        Daffy Duckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                        I respect all opinions man. THX.

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      3. 87

         Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Stuff and nonsense. 
         
         If a Hub complies with TOS, flagging won't do it any harm.  When a a Hubber flags a Hub, all it does is let HubPages know the Hub may be substandard in that Hubber's opinion.  It doesn't unpublish the Hub or affect its score.
         
         It's the moderators who make those decisions and only the moderators. 
         
         Unfortunately, the rules have changed and Hubs which were once OK, are not allowed now.  And some Hubs which simply weren't noticed before, when the site was more lax about checking for quality, are being picked up now.
         
         The bottom line is - the playing field has changed.  If HubPages doesn't change to suit the new playing field, it won't survive and we'll all lose all our Hubs, not just the few which are no longer compliant.  So suck it up.

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5. 93

   viking305posted 13 years ago

   Do you know what really annoys me though.  We are not given the chance to fix our hub BEFORE they are unpublished. 
   
   I got the email a few weeks back about the new changes and did go through all my hubs and change as per HubPages TOS. This took 2 full days and I thought I had fixed each one.  The quality of photos was not mentioned in this email.  None of the hubs were unpublished which was fine, because I was able to fix the hubs without any loss of income or ranking from Google. 
   
   But a few days ago one of my best performing hubs entitled Google Translator Toolbar was unpublished without prior warning. 
   
   The problem was I had a few photos that were not up to standard.  I agree totally with this appraisal.  But as all hubbers know it is very hard to change every single hub without forgetting a few.  It would have been better if I received an email to this effect and I would have made the changes immediately. 
   
   Instead the hub was unpublished, I made the changes straight away but the hub was not republished until this morning.  I have lost income from this hub, it has disappeared from the first page of Google search engine and the Hub itself is also down in page views overall.
   
   Surely the HubPages staff could give us a 12 hour window where we can fix the offending hub BEFORE it is unpublished. 
   
   I know they are busy with all the changes they are making in order to make Google happy and give us a better ranking.  This solution would also help the HubPages staff as they would not have a long queue of hubs that have been unpublished to see to.

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      Rosie2010posted 13 years agoin reply to this

      The exact same thing happened to me!  My highest traffic views and earning hub got unpublished because of a watermarked photo, but since I was sent an standard email stating so many possible answers as why my hub was unpublished, I couldn't figure out what was wrong with my hub.  I had to send an email to HP and waited for the reply that it was a watermarked photo.  The watermark was so light, I didn't notice it at first.   I deleted the photo and republished.  But by the time my hub got republished, my hub was nowhere to be found in google search... it used to be on page 1 and several days after it reappear on page 6.  It was dead by then.  I lost a lot of views and earnings because of that.  I like what you suggested.. it would have saved your hub and mine as well. (sigh)

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      wildernessposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Let me see if I understand this.  You published a substandard hub, either knowingly or because you didn't read the TOS.  For whatever reason (hub hoppers maybe) HP staff took a look at it and decided it was not up to snuff.  After you fix it they will have to look again - two visits and checks for one hub out of the million+ on HP.
      
      Now you want staff to look after 12 hours and, in the majority of cases (few hubbers will correct a hub in that amount of time as many don't even visit each day, let alone every 12 hours), unpublish it and then check it for a 3rd time after fixing.
      
      All because you didn't follow the TOS.  Bear in mind that while you personally may have tried to write by the TOS and write well, thousands more don't.  They just publish junk and move on, doing the same everywhere on the web.  And the work required by those thousands make it harder for all of us, including HP staff.

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      1. 93

         viking305posted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Hello wilderness
         
         I explained in my post what happened to my hub and how I felt about it. I made a suggestion that might stop this same thing happening again to me or other hubbers.
         
         Some would agree and others not.  You are entitled to your opinion as am I.  That is fine; we are here on a forum where conversations, suggestions and debate are encouraged.   
         
         It is up to you whether you agree with my post on this subject or not. But it is unnecessary for you to reply in such a tone.  You answered this post with a very sarcastic reply.  I do not appreciate this at all.

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6. 62

   Daniel Carterposted 13 years ago

   Adapt or die. That's what HP is facing and responding accordingly because of the G slap. Google doesn't build any time into anyone improving their site, it just happened over night. The quicker you respond, the quicker you can get back in better rankings. Same with writers.
   
   If this site isn't working for you, find one that does.
   
   There are definitely some problems at HP that effect good writers here. HP's response has been as good as they can offer for the pressure they are under. Perhaps their decisions aren't the best, I'll agree. It often doesn't seem right or fair, but unless you become as aggressive as HP in correcting your own rankings in Google, hang it up and go home.
   
   No victims, no hostages. Adapt aggressively, right now, or move on.

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      Mighty Momposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Good answer, Daniel Carter. I agree.
      The Internet is not a static medium. It changes and we must change with it. I feel we are lucky to have knowledgeable and caring Admin here at HP to help us improve. It's in everyone's best interest to make the requested changes. Not a bad idea to self-regulate as well.
      
      One thing I have noticed a lot of, because I always use the "suggest links" feature, is that I now have a bunch of hubs with 'broken links' messages. It used to be because YouTube unpublished songs. Now its because so many hubbers have either left or had their hubs unpublished. Oh well, it's not that big of a deal to go in and unlink....
      
      Also, once you fix a hub you can ask to have it reinstated. That process doesn't take long and is worth it.
      
      But if you don't like the new TOS, there are plenty of online writing sites. I hope you won't defect, tho! MM

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7. 67

   Rosie2010posted 13 years ago

   William, this is happening to almost everyone.  You could just have edited your 13 hubs to follow the new HP guidelines, instead of deleting them.  Change the low quality pictures, or use half width to get a better picture.  Add more wordings, if it is too short.  Just make sure your grammar and spelling are correct.  Hubpages is doing its best to improve its Google ranking because it'e been hit hard by the new Google algorithm. This is good for all of us. Don't take this personally.. I also had a few hubs that needed revision, and so did a lot of hubbers.

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8. 58

   Williamjordanposted 13 years ago

   I have to agree it's not all about me Hub Pages needs to live on. Who really care If I stay. I will miss Hub Pages but I agree their is no such thing as a victim I need to improve my writing or move on  down the road. Thanks to all the great Hubbers I have met and to all the great Hubbers that let me cry, the crying is over time for the next adventure hope to run into some of you along the way.

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   1. 59

      recommend1posted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Williamjordan - I have just read a few of your hubs and they are of high standard and original and moving etc etc - any problem with the writing itself is pretty minimal but occasionally funny - like cleaning vegetables to get rid of incests - this kind of thing, and the subject matter of some of your hubs, are likely to trip Google alarm bells for HP.
      
      Fixing your hubs is only a matter of going through them carefully - same as for everyone else here with unpublished hubs for some reason or other.
      
      I would think that a hubber like yourself with a social conscience, and the ability to write convicingly about these issues, would be an asset.

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         ewd76posted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I totally agree. I definitely prefer my incests with dessert. Kidding, I know it's a typo. It just struck me as funny.

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9. 60

   Sarah Connorposted 13 years ago

   The quality issues were driven by the recent Google algorithm change, which was designed to penalize poor quality by reducing the search rankings.  Overall, this is a very positive thing for the Internet and means that everyone will more easily find the great information they are looking for.  It also means that lots of the spam will loose its value.

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10. 78

    Charluposted 13 years ago

    Ok here's my 2 cents
    I had a hub unpublished and I knew it would be, but being the procrastinating person I am I waited (ouch) It was #1 with Google not a lot of traffic but hey I was ok with that since I'm just getting started (with HP). I then quickly changed the ads (to many) republished and I never lost my ranking.
    
    
    My 3 cents  I didn't think I was going to like this whole Google change until I went to look at a new hub the other day and found 2 of my hubs from last year June that had been lost in never never land (if it' not in the first 5 pgs) and they were not only on the first page but in the first 4!!!  Good unique article that moved up because of the changes so this could be a blessing in disguise.
    
    OK that's my 3 cents take it or leave it and have an incredible night.  Oh yeah join the ad program for more $$$$ I just did.
    Darn it that's 4 cents Sorry

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11. 67

    Joy56posted 13 years ago

    in line with the title of the thread.... I understand what you mean.....
    
    I have worked in places where they annoy people so much til they leave......  some call it bullying.  rules change in a place of employment, it is not just like they can tell you to go, not really that simple.......
    
    the tone of hub pages is definately changing.... but then nobody's been kicked out yet .... Maybe some would love to see loads of us kicked out?????

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12. 60

    Pandoras Boxposted 13 years ago

    I have nothing against hubpages cleaning the place up. Frankly they probably should have a long time ago. Unpublishing established hubs with absolutely no warning due to a pixelated image is unprofessional, inconsiderate and certainly counter-productive.

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    1. 65

       Mutiny92posted 13 years agoin reply to this

       It seems to be much more appropriate to send an email to the author asking them to resolve the discrepancy in XX days or the hub will be automatically unpublished.  Kind of an "innocent until proven guilty" thing.
       
       What turns me off more is the wordage on the emails that say "Please note that repeated violations will result in the banning of your account. "  I have a couple of hundred hubs and I missed a few that had one or two too many amazon capsules.  I guess I am now a "repeat offended" and "will result in the banning of my account".
       
       I hope they don't do that of course, but it is not a very nice piece of communication.

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13. 73

    WriteAngledposted 13 years ago

    I seem to remember reading an explanation from Maddie Ruud somewhere that the messages are worded harshly to deter spammers who exploit HP and post lots of c__p.
    
    However, I think it is highly unfortunate that the moderators have been allowed to send out these offensively phrased messages to genuine hubbers, who have perhaps not yet found their way round all the rules they may have inadvertently broken or who have overlooked one or two out of a large number of hubs. It must be particularly rankling when the rule that is broken is a new one, which forbids a practice today that was positively encouraged by HP in the past!
    
    Surely it only requires a few seconds for the moderators to check out a profile and establish whether they are dealing with a spammer or a genuine hubber? In the latter case, a more polite, personal note giving the *specific reason* for the unpublishing would be far more appropriate.
    
    As it stands, HP is upsetting a lot of good, long-established hubbers from whom it makes its money!

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       Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       I thought such professionals had thick skin.

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          WriteAngledposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          I think writers can be quite fragile when their writing is criticised...

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             Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

             Indeed.

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       recommend1posted 13 years agoin reply to this

       I agree totally.  The way it has been done has an air of arrogance about it, unpublishing rather than warning might get things done faster, but what is the rush?  This site will not rise from these ashes overnight.  Why isn't there a standard set of inxtructions, advice and examples etc - how  long would that have taken somebody to put together in a prominent place.
       
       These issues are about confidence in the team that is the steward of our stuff - a confidence that is not very  high at the moment. 
       
       This was not helped by the recent virus in the Hubpages advert that somehow got onto so many sites. That it was there at all was at the least incompetent - then to come here and tell us that "HP had found a virus" and that "a few memebers may have 'noticed' " . . . when umpteen threads had been screaming about it all weekend without any 'notice' from HP staff   -   Thinking that the contributors to this site are stupid and won't notice this kind of BS is not really a good idea - is it?

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       Trish_Mposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       I have to agree with this

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    4. 87

       Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       If that explanation is true, what a ridiculous idea!  Spammers have a thick skin and won't be deterred by a few harsh words, but people who've innocently made a mistake could be driven away.  That needs to be rethought immediately.

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          Trish_Mposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Yes, I received the following response/ explanation from Jason Menayan, when I said that I felt unhappy about the messages I had received about an unpublished hub, which (A) I didn't understand and (B) made me feel like a troll:
          
          'These notifications were not meant to treat you or any other good Hubber like a troll. We tend to be firm in our email notifications, since most of the violators are very much deliberate and need to have this message communicated with utmost clarity, but we're certainly open to suggestions if you have them. ...'
          
          'Going through the corpus of over 1 million Hubs takes a lot of time, and we are trying to do it as quickly as possible while being thorough and careful.'
          
          http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/73320?page=2

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14. 57

    BaliMermaidposted 13 years ago

    I have no complaint with the desire of HubPages and most of the writers that regularly submit Hubs to the best of their ability to raise the quality of Hubs produced, individually and as a whole. I also have no complaint with constructive criticism.
    
    Since, evidently, there are a lot of members, notice I did not say writers, that joined but rarely, if ever, publish anything I have concerns that these people also HOP and flag hubs.
    
    It should be quite easy for HubPages to set a limit, as an example let's say the Hub Author Score of 75, before any member is allowed to HOP and reek havoc over hubs they could not produce if their last name was Hemingway.
    
    If this is already the case then please accept my apologies for expressing my concern.

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       sunforgedposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       please examine what it means to be "flagged"

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          BaliMermaidposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Thank you for your suggestion. With all due respect, I did look up the term and how it differs from moderation before I made my comment.
          
          My point remains the same. With staff moderators swamped I feel only members proficient enough to have a Hub author score of 75 or above should be allowed to flag.
          
          Just my opinion. 
          
          I have friends that I see, in person and not online, several times a week, and I have stopped them from flagging some hubs they could probably never have produced themselves.

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15. 87

    mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years ago

    Whilst I agree that many 'writers' or should I say 'posters' deserve to be unpublished until they correct violations, (in fact often should never be allowed to publish a second hub after their initial publications), I do find it frustrating to have a hub (such as one I had today), unpublished due to pixelised images, that when I checked the hub in question were pictures that were easy to view, only mildly pixelised and were very funny. This hub is a good hub that has been published so long it is unreal, and has loads of positive comments. I see loads of unmitigated 'cr*p' published here, and this kind of obvious 'flagging' is petty. Yes, I went back to the hub, and it still took me two attempts at scrolling through it to even find the 'offending' pictures.
    I know I said I would never leave Hubpages, but now I say 'Never say never'. Things are just going too far on occasion here.

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16. 57

    BaliMermaidposted 13 years ago

    Fed Up - You bet I am but no one is for improving quality more than me so I will just bite my tongue and take it.
    
    Just deleted a hub that had 35,000 page views in one year. Was a good money maker with over 30 inbound links that came all on their own, totally organic back links that I can only supposed were made based on the quality of the hub.
    
    After trying twice to please "whomever" with changes, exactly the same as those that corrected and cleared a previous hub, I gave up and deleted the thing.
    
    I am a team player but I do not agree with nebulous, unspecified and unfathomable, unidentifiable reasons for taking a quality, money making hub out of publication. But rather that risk being accused of resubmitting a "substandard" albeit high traffic money making hub repeatedly I bit the bullet and trashed it.
    
    Some thing is wrong and I honestly do not believe it all lies in the laps of the Hubber side of the community. Enough said!

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       viking305posted 13 years agoin reply to this

       I am sorry to hear you deleted your successful hub.  I agree with you though it is very frustrating to have a hub unpublished without warning for the violation of the TOS of a substandard photo.  Which was a new rule and as far as I was aware there was NO prior warning to this for hubbers. 
       
       You have probably already published this deleted hub somewhere else but that will take many months maybe a year to reach the page views etc you achieved here.  All your backlinks are lost too.
       
       I still stand by my suggestion that a warning email would be more appropriate BEFORE automatic unpublishing.
       
       My hub that like yours was doing very well with backlinks and traffic has not recovered yet.  It was always up there with over 100 views a day and score of 90+.  No it is getting 6 to 7 views a day. 
       
       I do accept totally that the photo was substandard because it was a little blurred but not the way the hub was treated.  What I did was delete All the photos in this hub just to be sure. 
       
       I understand and accept totally that the staff at HubPages are doing all they can for themselves and the hubbers to get rid of the substandard hubs here.  This will in time get us back in Google’s good books. 
       
       I feel though that this automatic unpublishing of hubs is not very productive and is upsetting a lot of good writers here.     
       
       I have also read somewhere that now RSS feeds of our own latest or best hubs are not accepted either. This may or may not be true because I have not been able to confirm this as fact so rather than take a chance I went back to all my hubs and deleted all RSS feeds.  This included ones from hubs I had entered for the 60 day challenge. The hubmob weekly challenge also requires a writer to include their rss feed but I deleted them from all my hubs too.
       
       Hopefully things will settle down soon because to be honest every time I open my HubPages account and go to My Account I dread looking at the hubs list in case another of my hubs has been automatically unpublished.

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          BaliMermaidposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Yes frustrating, isn't it.  In my case who said it was a photo.  I have absolutely no idea what the problem was. The pictures were all mine and nothing was pixelated as far as I could see.
          
          When we hop hubs and decide to flag a hub normally a comment is requested, if not requred on why it was flagged.  Why could that comment not be passed to the owner of the hub?  That could be a software change and not take up any of the limited time of moderators. They are rushing too much as it is so it seems counterproductive for things like this to happen.

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          mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

          I hope you are wrong about the RSS feeds, as I have been making a concerted effort to put an RSS feed at the bottom of all my Hubs linking to my own latest Hubs, touch wood, so far I have not been pulled up on it.
          
          As I mentioned in an earlier post here, I have had a problem with a hub being unpublished for a pixelated image, and found that out of over 100 pictures on the Hub, there were 3, that were very mildly blurred, but not badly. The pictures were of funny and mistranslated signs, so were humorous enough that is was a shame to lose them from the Hub. However I dutifully deleted them and ask the Team to review the hub again. Today I check my emails and I have had an email referring to the same Hub telling me it is now in violation and unpublished because the adverts or links were not relevant to the content so I needed to revise them. I went back to the hub and found that out of four adverts two were links to e-books on 'How to be Funny' and 'How to make Women Laugh', One was for an Amazon humorous sign and the only other one Ebay had produced an odd choice for their advert that was not really on topic as humour, but this could have changed any time, and it was literally only one item. I deleted the Ebay advert and one of the E-books but I am frustrated that this wasn't mentioned in the first email about the pictures so I could have sorted it all out at once. Then, in the second email, it seems three out of four of the adverts were on topic, as the hub was designed to make people laugh when they read the funny examples of mistranslated or humorous road signs, park signs, zoo signs, menus etc.
          
          It just seems so petty now, and like you, I dread checking my emails or my account each day in case another hub has been unpublished for some very minor reason.

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             viking305posted 13 years agoin reply to this

             I could well be wrong about the RSS feeds but I was not taking any chances to be honest.  I have been reading all the forum posts about the new rules for a while now and have a recollection of someone saying that the RSS feeds to latest and best hubs whether our own or others was now NOT acceptable. 
             
             But I could not find the Forum post.  I took them all out of my hubs because the consequences of this being correct would have meant instant unpublishing of maybe about 30 or 40 of my hubs.
             
             I do not have EBay on any of my hubs but again I did read in another  forum post that many hubbers were experiencing difficulties with new TOS for HubPages and EBay.  Some had deleted their EBay capsules too. 
             
             If you do a search on the help forums you may be able to find it. Or you could send an email to HubPages Staff and ask for clarification about their new policy on EBay capsules.
             
             If you have quite a few hubs with EBay capsules in them at least it would save you the worry of that dreaded email to say yet another hub has been unpublished.

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                mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                Thanks Viking, I might just look into that, just in case. I do wish their emails were more specific. The problem Hub I described before, I resubmitted for publication this afternoon (having removed the two adverts I mentioned earlier). I left on one for the Humorous sign (an Amazon advert) and one link to an E-Book on 'How to make women laugh' (the hub is a humorous hub so I didn't think this would be a problem). I got yet another email from them saying again that the adverts on the hub are unrelated to the subject of the Hub and the hub has been unpublished (even though it already was anyway). Perhaps it is because of the RSS feed on it, but they haven't made that very clear. Anyway, I have now emailed them to ask for clarification as to what exactly the problem is and I am stumped.

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                mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                By the way, you are correct about the RSS feeds to our own latest Hubs not being permitted. What a nightmare. I now have to go through all my Hubs and try to find the ones I put RSS feeds on and then delete those capsules. This is going to take ages.
                
                To add insult to injury another rule change now says we can't use affiliate links to sites that sell ebooks such as Clickbank, so I will now have to move a load of my hubs to Excerptz.com now if I want to avoid losing the revenue I make from the Clickbank sales. I wouldn't mind this if the e-books I linked to were rubbish, but they are relevant to the topic of each Hub I have included them on, e.g. A How to Grow Vegetables Organically ebook, on a Hub to do with Growing Vegetables.

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             Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

             Misty, I'd love to know who is advising Hubbers to do that, because it's a really bad idea.  It means you have a lot of irrelevant links on your Hub - which is bad for Google rank, but could also lead to your Hub being unpublished.  That's been mentioned countless times in the forums, even before the Panda update.
             
             Have a RSS feed by all means, but use a tag so it only shows your related Hubs, otherwise you just dilute your keywords to no benefit.
             
             BTW I'm also disappointed about Clickbank - I agree there's a ton of junk on that site, but I had found one excellent book which I've recommended on nearly all my ballet Hubs.

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                Trish_Mposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                Hi
                
                I, too, was under the impression that adding RSS links to our own hubs was considered a good idea.
                
                I am now slowly going through my articles, removing capsules that I only recently added.
                
                I didn't tend to frequent the forum, until recently, so didn't see anything to the contrary ~ but I read this in some advice hubs by respected hubbers.
                
                If they are not wanted, then why do we have the default 'latest' / 'hottest' / 'best' RSS links? ~ I don't understand it ~ it seems pointless confusing and to me.

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                   Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                   If you can remember who they were, perhaps it's time to leave a comment on those Hubs asking them to revise them! 
                   
                   The other thing is that, unfortunately, you'll see some inexperienced Hubbers pretending to be authorities and writing  "how to" Hubs when they haven't the slightest idea what they're talking about...
                   
                   
                   
                   Because they're very useful, but you have to add your own tag so they only show your related Hubs.

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                mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                Hi Marissa, I obviously missed those forum posts, both before and after the Panda update, but please can you tell me how we use RSS and then add a tag so it only shows our 'related' and therefore relevant hubs. Thanks

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                   IzzyMposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                   Can I answer this one?
                   
                   Say you have a few hubs about dog collars for example. You could inter-relate them into a group called mistydogc, for example. Make a name up.
                   
                   You put the mistydogc tag in all those inter-related hubs and that makes an rss feed when you click on them.
                   
                   The rss address will be http://hubpages.com/tag/mistydogc/hot?rss pr latest?rss or even best?rss.
                   
                   You then insert this feed address into an rss capsule in those hubs.
                   
                   The feed is then directly relevant to your hubs, and shouldn't be removed by anyone. (the ads should be the same)

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                      mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                      That sounds great Izzy, but can I ask how specific the tag has to be, i.e. could I use one saying simply 'growingveg' and place it in all similar hubs, or would it need to specify exactly what aspect of 'growing veg' I was referring to, e.g. in containers, for exhibition or as a small business etc?
                      
                      Thanks

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                         lrohnerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                         You just need to be sure it's unique enough that no other hubber is using it for a tag. I start all my custom tags with my initials -- LR.

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                            mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                            Great tip Irohner, thanks for that

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                         IzzyMposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                         I would think that growingveg is specific enough. I mean that will catch all the growingveg ads whether or not it is in containers or not.
                         But as lrohner says, your tag should be completely individual - you don't want someone's else's growingveg tag in your feed, so add a couple of letters of your own.
                         
                         How you group your hubs is up to you. The word you use to group them also doesn't matter as only you will know. You could call it mistyveg or mveg or even msopo  - something that isn't already in use, nor likely to be.

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                            mistyhorizon2003posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                            Cheers, this is such great advice, and I am sure I am not the only one who will find it really useful. Thanks again

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    earnestshubposted 13 years ago

    I got a notice about a pixelated graphic the other day, took it out and they republished it the very next day.
    I'm good with that.

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    IzzyMposted 13 years ago

    Hey you're welcome, but I think Hubpages want us only to link things together that will show similar ads.
    
    I have 'growing plants' feeds, and not had an issue about them yet, but I also had a feed I thought all office products could go under.
    
    You know, office desks, computer desks, computers, computer peripherals.
    
    But got a hub about computer mice in the same feed unpublished for showing unrelated content.
    
    I suppose on reflection, the ads would be too wide ranging. Worth remembering.
    
    Edit: I thought the purpose of the feed was to offer the reader a similar themed item, but it does also affect the ad placements.

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    mdlawyerposted 13 years ago

    It is hoped that things will improve soon.

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